A Rose Bowl Ride Primer (Part 2)
- By Banner Moffat
I originally wrote this Primer years ago for friends who were thinking of giving the Rose Bowl Ride a try. Some of them went on to become reliable Rose Bowl regulars. So if you are new to the ride or thinking about doing it, maybe this will help "bring you up to speed":
Drafting
Sometimes when you are completely surrounded by the pack you don't even have to pedal, and out of the corner of your eye you see someone on the outskirts pedaling furiously and still not keeping up. The price you pay is that you are trapped and at the mercy of any incompetence surrounding you. However, any time you need a rest or want to conserve energy what I call "the embracing arms of the pack" can be magic.
You do get a little draft outside the pack as long as you are close beside it and back from the front a ways. Two can draft off one by sharing the slip stream, but it is easiest when you are smack in the middle of it directly behind someone. You can feel the wind lightly buffeting both shoulders and it gets quieter. You pay a potentially big price of less visibility, however.
Although putting your front wheel about 6 inches behind the next guy's rear wheel gives the maximum draft, in such a loosely organized pack with a wide variety of skill levels, you should give yourself a bigger and safer gap. When the rider in front of you is large, the more of a pull you get from his draft but... the worse the visibility. Sometimes you get a skinny, short rider whose draft is useless. I call them vampires because it is like they cast no shadow.
You need to be a steady rider and able to prevent gaps from opening up in front of you to be a good person to draft behind. The less you use your brakes the better, and sometimes you can sit up rather than put on your brakes to slow down a little and that helps the riders behind you by pushing more air out of their way. Sometimes changing "lanes" has to be done, but keep in mind it makes drafting behind you harder. In the races when you see a rider trying to break away from the pack they swerve all over the place trying to make it as difficult for the chasers as possible. Don't try that at the Rose Bowl.
Corners
Cornering in a tight pack can be nerve wracking for riders new to the experience since you have to do it exactly in concert with the riders around you. I keep my vision low and not focused on any one thing but rather try to see all my peripheral vision at once. Instead of steering based on where you are going you steer based on the riders around you. You have to look at the wheels around you as stationary objects and as long as they stay stationary or if they move away, all is well. If they move toward you you have to make the minimum adjustment to stay as close to the middle of all of them as possible.
Often there is an accordion effect at the corners which is most pronounced back in the pack. The whole pack slows down to fit through the bottleneck of the corner and then speeds up to catch up with itself and re-form as a pack. This slowing and speeding costs extra energy for the riders at the back of the pack who likely can least afford it and for the strong riders at the front, the corners are perfectly smooth and steady. It's one of those, "the harder I work, the luckier I get" type of situations.
Being on the outside or inside of the pack can make cornering easier, but there is more wind and you have to stay out of the pedestrian white line on the inside and beware of cars on the outside.
Pulling
Someone has to be in front and no one does it for long because it is a lot of work; as much as 30% more work. Usually there are 10 or so riders single file at the front and the one pulling will move to one side when he has had enough and number 2 becomes number one. You can be number 10 and feeling good, but as you move up one by one, the draft gets thinner, the pedaling harder and you start to wonder if you can keep up the pace. If you move out of line early before you do your pull, the rider behind you will momentarily hate you because he has to close the gap. So it is best if you can hang in there, and there is no shame in doing a short pull - 5 or 10 seconds even - and a series of short pulls is actually more efficient and can pick up the pace of the whole pack.
After pulling you either find a place to slide back in line or more often you just get overtaken by the bulk of the pack, and, while huffing and puffing, you try to find a spot with enough draft to catch your breath. It can be hard if the pack speeds up just as you finish pulling. That's when you find yourself going from first to last in a pack of over a hundred in seconds. Don't be afraid to pull even though it may make it hard to keep up. It's great practice and you are there to get a work out aren't you?
When you move over at the end of your pull, always be careful that you are not being overtaken on that side. Sometimes riders decide you are not pulling fast enough and start overtaking you before you are done pulling. Other times they just yell at you to pedal harder as if you weren't already giving them your heart and lungs on a platter.
Sometimes, not too often, on a slow day you can try to pull and no one follows you. You find yourself out in front with no one drafting behind you. I like to pretend that I'm too strong for the pack and enjoy the fantasy while I can - until the pack catches up as they always do, and I'm once again struggling to keep up.
Getting dropped
It has happened to almost everyone in the pack at one time or other so don't worry about it. It's supposed to be hard; all the riders at the front of the pack are doing their damnedest to make it hard and if it was easy we wouldn't be there. Sometimes you either don't have the legs, the lungs or technique and the only way to get them is to keep trying. I guarantee if you keep trying every Tuesday and Thursday and try again every time the pack passes you after getting dropped, you will eventually keep up for the full 10 laps. Money back guarantee!
Out of the blue, sometimes the pack speeds up and stretches out and it can be a lot of hard work to hang in there. If you have any strength left in you, don't give up because it always slows back down sooner or later and if you are still in the pack, you will get your recovery. Often the difference between keeping up and getting dropped is just 20 seconds more of pushing hard.
I used to be annoyed by how riders who I knew were not as fit as I was would hang in there while I would get dropped like a wet rag. They were riding on experience, not muscle and knew how to conserve energy with smart drafting and how to time their exertions to the ebb and flow of the pack.
When you are dropped, you can ride at your own pace till the pack laps you and then can try to jump back in, or you can fall in with some other mini pack. Occasionally you get dropped only to find you were in a break away pack and didn't know it. Then, if you are not too tuckered out, you can happily join the "B" pack.
Break-aways
Break-aways are when a front group opens a significant gap between them and the main pack. If it is just a few riders, they will almost always be caught and swallowed up by the pack. When there are about 10 or more and if they know how to work together with good rotation at pulling (or they are much stronger than the main pack), it can succeed in staying off the front to the end.
Usually the people at the head of the main pack take break-aways as a challenge and will pick up the pace to catch them. Being part of a break-away can be exciting, but it can also be a mistake. I've been spit out the back of break-aways so exhausted that I couldn't even keep up with the "B" pack. Likewise, sometimes the whole pack is going just too damn fast and you expect to get dropped any second. Then suddenly, like a blessing from God, the break-away occurs and now that the strongest riders have left the pack behind, you can hang in there with a new lease on life.
The hard part can be if you are right there at the point of separation. Do you close the gap like you should? Do you jump forward to become part of the break-away? Or do you hang back in relative comfort and think of all your justifications for being a "B" pack rider?
The Sprint
I can't tell you how to sprint because I'm a lousy sprinter at best. I can tell you what it is. The second half of the last lap is usually fairly fast coming up to the last SW corner as those who want to be at the front move up and those who are already there try to hold their position. Usually the pack separates a bit after the last corner as the sprinters (or want-to-be sprinters like me) pull away from those who don't care. The real sprint starts on the down side of the small hill in the middle of the west side and everyone tries to get to the line first. A lot of riders poop out before they get there and the others have to maneuver around them. If you poop out, hold a steady line and try not to get in the way. Hold a steady line after the sprint too. There is a lot of mixing up after the sprint when some riders glide, others pedal and others pull over.
An interesting phenomenon has occurred to me several times which might give you a clue how to achieve good sprinting position. First I would decide that I was not going to sprint that day and so would hang back from the very front and stay towards the outside where I might not be in the way. The next thing I know, just by following whatever wheel is in front of me, I have been pulled to the front and am in perfect position for the sprint - something I don't always accomplish when I am really trying!
The Reason Why
One part of why is the thrill; the same urge that sends people to the roller coaster. Bicycling as fast as you can (in fact much faster than you could alone) inches away from other bikers and surrounded by hundreds of people experiencing the same thing is a thrill. Being in front and setting the pace for a couple hundred riders behind you even for only a few seconds is a thrill. Merely not getting dropped for more laps than ever have before is a thrill.
I have a theory that activities which require intense concentration on what is happening in the world around you are very therapeutic, and the Rose Bowl ride fits the bill. You forget your worries, your job, your past and for a little while you exist completely in present time. You are just a hyper-alert pedalling machine constantly adjusting the body and the bike to do what needs to be done. There's not much room for daydreaming on the Rose Bowl ride! After exerting yourself like that and concentrating so hard, it's amazing how refreshed and relaxed you can feel afterwards.
It's a great work out. The pack never asks you if you are feeling okay today or if you really want to do 10 laps or if now is a good time to speed up. You just do what it tells you and recover later and in that way it can be better than the highest priced Beverly Hills personal coach. It can be heartless: if you don't have the strength or skill, it's hard to kid yourself that you do as the tail end of the pack pulls away like a missed train. And the ride happens like clockwork twice a week. There is no organizing required by anybody; just show up and ride.
People need a challenge to feel alive. First there is just doing the 10 laps, then there is being able to move to the front, then there is the ability to close a gap when it happens, then there is the occasional pull on a slow day, then there is a pull when the pack is really cooking, and then there is always the sprint at the end.
Seeing the pack stretch out in front of you like a quarter mile long snake -- catching someone's wheel that pulls you right up to the front -- doing more than you thought you could, again and again -- closing a gap with an effort that feels like throwing yourself on a handgranade to keep the pack together -- going from complete exhaustion after a pull to feeling ready to crank your way back to the front after a miracle recovery in the draft -- having found the strength in the sprint that others have lost on earlier laps -- getting high on endorphins from a great workout when earlier you were considering a nap on the couch instead -- flying over the landscape surrounded by riders who are experiencing the same thrill as you -- these are some of the reasons why.